


What You've Been Missing

by HalcyonFrost



Series: Gifts and Prompts [5]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Hopeful Ending, Loki Feels, Loki Needs a Hug, Not Thor: The Dark World Compliant, Obsessive Behavior, Pre-Slash, Prompt Fic, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-11
Updated: 2016-08-11
Packaged: 2018-08-07 23:56:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,339
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7734811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalcyonFrost/pseuds/HalcyonFrost
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony is set on finding out what Loki's thieving is leading up to, and Loki is trying to fix what he lost. Tony finds Loki, but doesn't find what he thought he would. A word Tony thought to never define himself with turns out to fit him like a glove after all. Worse yet, it fits both himself and Loki.</p>
            </blockquote>





	What You've Been Missing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [usedupshiver](https://archiveofourown.org/users/usedupshiver/gifts).



> Usedupshiver prompted for 11: Obsession from [this prompt meme](http://halcyonfrost.tumblr.com/post/147821371610/30-day-dark-fandom-otp-writing-challenge) on my Tumblr!

"Obsession" was too strong a word.

Tony preferred "determined" or even "stubborn", but calling him _obsessed with Loki_ was like a slap in his face by a bunch of hypocrites. There was no reason for them to ask Tony rude questions about why Tony was so focused on this project. As if he didn't usually put all of his attention to worthy causes like catching a freaking inter-realm thief and - with possible extenuating circumstances no less making him so - an inter-planetary war criminal. Granted, it was Tony that went about looking into and discovering possible evidence that Loki wasn't as at fault for the fight in Manhattan as he was first assumed to be, and Tony sought out that information without prompting and for his own curiosity when few other suspected it. Yes, Tony had a bit of a thing surrounding the mystery that was Loki and his motives ever since Thor told them of Loki's escape from Asgard's cells in a way that didn't scream "villain" trickery so much as it screamed "opportunistic asshole that could sweet-talk a matador out of a bull-fighting ring" trickery.

So Tony could see _some_ similarities. Where that gave his friends the right to compare him to Loki and say he was getting just as infatuated with his goals as Loki was with his own? It didn't excuse it at all. That was _bullshit_ , and not a one of them had the decency to apologize when Tony got offended and bit back. If Tony could just get Loki under lock and key, then he could fucking _prove_ to them how much he wasn't like Loki.

Tony wasn't obsessed; _everyone_ was - or should have been - dedicated to finding out how Loki was snatching up all this stuff and what the hell he was doing with it. The reason for food was obvious enough, as was various previously-thought-to-be-and-now-confirmed-as magical baubles - exact uses were unknown, but Loki was a mage, so it wasn't a wild guess to say he would be use them for magic. But when Loki began to be connected to the theft of materials of mineral nature from various kinds of elements to raw rock, in amounts that was concerning for one mineral let alone twenty of them, then Tony was going to get _determined_ to find out just what the fuck was the latest plot.

Thor claimed, in a suspiciously bland tone, that he had no theories of what Loki could be using such materials for.

Steve said that he didn't trust Loki to be planning anything good with it.

Bruce, Natasha, and Clint all said in similar words that, in Loki's not-so-stable mental state, anything sane was out of the realm of possibility.

All five of them advised Tony to not poke around looking for Loki’s home base when they didn't know what else would lurk there upon arrival.

Fury just told Tony to find Loki by any means necessary. Even if it meant not telling the Avengers what Tony was up to.

Pepper was pretty pissed when she found out, and it took Rhodey telling her that he would take care of setting Tony straight before she would agree to leave Tony alone. Rhodey then turned around and asked what he could do to help find the missing demigod.

Three months of tracking and creating algorithms for testing and more tracking that led to dead ends across four continents, and finally Loki showed up on the map long enough in fits and spurts for Tony and Rhodey to follow the patterns. One look at the fallen alien prince on a surveillance video pretty well confirmed the "not sane" theory too.

Loki looked _wrung out_. Desperate and stretched thin, worse than he even looked after coming through the portal at Project PEGASUS, and relentlessly pushing on for something that must have been pretty strong to keep him going at this rate.

Almost immediately, Rhodey started questioning the planned direct approach, but considering the lack of any other options, it was what they were left with doing. Rhodey never questioned that they had to figure out what Loki's goal was.

It took a _very_ direct approach after all.

They knew where Loki's teleportation/rift-jumping - Thor couldn't precisely pinpoint which one it was that Loki was capable of, or if he was in fact capable of both - sites were, and they caught up to him right before the point that Loki usually disappeared off map for several days after passing through. In a move straight out of a bad 80's flick, Tony and Rhodey followed up to him and grabbed on just as Loki was shifting. It landed them in a heap of tangled limbs on a stone floor that was definitely not the rural Norwegian marketplace that they had been three seconds earlier, and Loki threw both humans off with his hands and a roar of frustrated rage.

"How dare you! What are you doing here?!"

"Pretty obvious what we're here for, I thought." Tony climbed to his feet with Rhodey's help (the soldier was always quick to get upright), his only weapons for defense the gauntlets he and Rhodey brought off of their suits.

"You're not welcome here. Get out." He looked even more frenzied here - his chest was heaving with labored breath, posture tense and unprepared, purple bags under his eyes so deep they almost met the halfway point of his long nose, eyes wide, and the odd light from the cave walls turning usually vivid irises into dark pools too deep and too changeable with emotion as he tried to figure out what to do.

Lord, they really did catch Loki well and truly unawares. What was Loki _doing_ here that had him so off-kilter? What happened to him before this?

"Yeah, can't get out. You brought us here, unintentionally though it was. And it's not looking like you have the juice to send us back."

Bared teeth like the caged, trapped being that he was, Loki said nothing to refute that, which was really just as telling.

He drew a dagger from the small of his back under his coat. "Then I can _kill you both_ and solve my problems with you little rodents for good."

"No, see, that's going to be worse, because then you'll be a recent murderer of two fine protectors of earth, and you'll have hell on your tail."

"I don’t need to live forever. Just long enough to fix things."

"Fix things?" Rhodey questioned, and Tony finally let his attention drag away from the potential murderer and definite thief to instead look around the cave instead. Odd light. Understatement.

Behind them, it was a black, unlit pit as far as Tony could see, with no pin dot or sliver of natural light to follow. Ahead of them, towards Loki and towards what looked like the back of the cave - or maybe just one pocket, considering Tony couldn't see a front of the cave either, and caves didn't exactly form like perfect little tunnels straight in and straight out - was lit with lanterns glowing with mossy green light suspended unevenly from thick plant roots overgrown like lattice work covering the walls. They only grew more frequent as they neared the teardrop-shaped far wall. There were holes like skylights no wider than the length of Tony's forearm in random patterns across the ceiling, but the light that came through was dusky, and when Tony stepped forward to look directly up, he could only see a dense canopy of trees and the faint, late afternoon light that managed to make it through as wind rustled the leaves.

A forest probably? But none that Tony knew of right off. None with such cool air or animals that sounded like what Tony could faintly hear through the ceiling. _Sooooo_... not earth. Great. Stuck with an unstable, magic-drained mage on some other planet. Super.

"I don't care how you manage it or if you survive it, but you cannot stay here." Loki said again, and he had noticeably taken a couple steps backwards.

"You're hiding something."

"It's no business of yours. _Leave_."

"We can't." Rhodey said. "We can't go back home and keep people off your back when we're stuck here. We came to find out what you're doing with things you stole from our planet."

"Nothing that concerns you! You wouldn't understand, and my actions have no impact on you or your people. Just leave me be. I'll take you back to your planet when I recover, but don't interfere in my affairs."

"Well, we're not just going to wander up top and wait for you to get enough power to zap us back to earth!" Tony said. "We're staying right here."

"No. No, you can't. If your presence disturbs the process-"

"What process?"

" _You wouldn't understand_."

"Then help us understand." Rhodey offered. "Explain it in a way we might see it from your point of view."

"You never do. No one ever does. I will not have my work undone."

"Try us. And if we do something you don't like, you still have the knife. We'll see if it's faster than ours." Tony waved both armored hands in example, but Rhodey had kept his hands at his sides for a few moments. Both of them could see that Loki was not on even ground, but that the likelihood of him actually attacking the humans was fairly low.

Loki's shoulders slumped in dejection, eyes wet and so wanting for anything but where he found himself - faced with mortal enemies that he didn't even have the strength to face currently. Stuck and having to deal with the unlucky hands he was served. "You're asking me to be at your mercy. Two against one."

"We promise not to attack you first."

For a brief moment, Loki looked mildly more like himself, and it was a look of utter mockery. "That's very comforting."

"Honest to gods." Tony got halfway through making the sign of the cross over himself before stopping with a guilty grin. "Alright, just trust your judgment of us then. Do you trust our word when I say that I won't do anything to harm you at this point in time unless you make a move to harm me or Rhodey first in this cave. And Rhodey will promise the same, won't you, buddy?"

"We won't hurt you if you don't hurt us, previous injuries notwithstanding." Rhodey promised.

The god still looked dubious, but he also looked like there wasn't much else to do. Because _there wasn't_. Neither Tony nor Rhodey was leaving without Loki sending them back, and Loki wasn't going to replenish his magic in five minutes flat. This was going to take time, and either Loki fessed up now or Tony and Rhodey would find a way to find out Loki's secret on their own and out of context for why.

"Alright." Loki finally agreed. "But don't. Touch. Anything. If you disturb her, I'll cut off your head before you can even question it." Loki turned and led the way towards the space beyond their landing site, and Rhodey and Tony shared an equally confused look of _"What does he mean 'her'?"_

When they passed the half-wall of rock that had blocked their view of the space earlier, there was no mistaking what was there on the floor. Centered and surrounded by light from the lanterns and more stands of Loki's making to illuminate closer, the coffin was the obvious focus. The sides were inscribed with runes and arcane symbols and designs - not just those that appeared to be Asgardian either, but multiple scripts from multiple cultures and times. Tony recognized hieroglyphics, Arabic, Brahmi with a little squinting; others still that Tony could neither put a name to or recognize as earth-origin. It wasn't just Loki's own magic that the demigod was attempting to use; he seemed to be trying anything and everything looking for something that did what he wanted. Desperation again. Obsession with getting what he wanted. Such a need for it that he took over everything, including maintaining his own health.

Even if Tony didn't understand the coffin, he understood that much. Maybe "determined" hadn't been a strong enough word for Tony's... for Tony's own _obsession_ with tracking down and figuring out Loki. For Tony, he had friends and comrades to keep his fixation in check. For Loki? Who did Loki have? Except for a corpse, apparently?

Beautiful as the woman inside of it was once Tony got close enough to see, she was still very obviously not just sleeping. Her body was set in its tomb so carefully - her face draped with thin fabric like gossamer; fresh ivory flowers crowning her head; ornate armor to strength her; and a sword heavily etched with Asgardian runes resting between her clasped hands to protect her. She was cared for and loved, but she was still given all the signs of being a strength in her own right and not just someone else's devotion.

"Who is this?" Rhodey's voice sounded haunted, shaky even when he was trying to keep it even.

"Frigga." Loki's voice was barely audible, in comparison. "Frigga, Queen of Asgard. My mother."

Tony and Rhodey both let that sink in and Loki stood closer than they did, the god's hands just above the coffin's edge, like even he was afraid to touch her housing and ruin whatever spells he had last tried to... to do whatever he was trying.

Thor had said that, before returning to earth, there was an invasion on Asgard - dark elves thought to be extinct had infiltrated Asgard, broken Loki out of his cell on their way out, and amidst the chaos, Loki had been separated from the elven pair. The pair that then killed the queen while trying - and failing - to steal back a lost gem. The Thunderer also said that Loki had killed the elves responsible, plus more in his way, before he left Asgard, but that part was barely a mention before Thor went on a much longer saga of his Jane and how she adapted without the dark elf leader to release the gem's influence from her system.

"So when Thor said that when you escaped, you stole something precious that didn't belong to you-"

"Frigga belongs to no one." Loki defended hotly, with sudden vehemence. "She is no one's to claim as a belonging."

"Then why do you have her here in a box?"

Loki's face crumpled again, and Jesus fucking Christ, Tony was not prepared to handle _this_.

"She's all I have. She tried so hard to save me, and I couldn't even save her the one time it mattered. I couldn't leave her."

"Then what are you hoping to fix?"

A pause. Then: "I was hoping to bring her back to life."

"What?!" Rhodey and Tony shouted at the same time, but Loki didn't so much as flinch.

"I've tried everything I know and more that I didn't know. I've sought spells from every corner of the galaxy and realms that I can reach, and _nothing's worked_. But I can't leave her. I can't give up on her." He sank to his knees beside the coffin, face hidden between his still raised arms. "She never gave up on me, when all I did was disappoint her."

Tony and Rhodey shared another "so not prepared for this" look of helplessness, but Tony opted to step closer to the unbalanced demigod first. His gauntleted hand hovered over Loki's shoulder, knowing Loki could use the support and somehow not quite feeling like he could provide it.

Finally, Rhodey said something: "You have to her go. You can't destroy yourself caring for her like this."

"I can't return her to Asgard. They know _nothing_ of her value. They would mourn for their queen like they had a right to, and then disrespect her by using her name for their own purposes and motives and in acts she would never forgive. If they want to smear my name for taking her away from that, then so be it. If they want to hunt down and kill her son in her name, I won't let them. I will live solely to spite them. But I will _not_ give her back to them. "

"Then don't." Tony allowed and let a small sigh out as he removed one gauntlet and put his hand to one of Loki's, gently pressing it down to touch the coffin's lip, breaking the invisible barrier Loki set for himself. Loki was shaking so faintly that it couldn't be seen, but touching his hand felt like holding onto a rumbling machine, he was holding back so much. He didn't make a sound, but the way his back heaved in long breaths to exhale them like a punch to the chest said enough of what he was hiding too.

_Don't let them see you cry. Never let them see you cry._

It was ingrained in Tony for decades too. He had to hear it even when...

"Where else am I to go then?" Loki's voice was _wrecked_ , rough as a growl but soft in volume with misery. "Where else is _she_ to go?"

Tony glanced up at one of the natural skylights and at the mystery landscape beyond the rock over their heads. "What planet are we on?"

"Vanaheim. She loved it here."

"Do, uh..." Who lived on Vanaheim again? Ugh. Improvise. "Do the people of Vanaheim know she's here? Do they know _you're_ here? And allow it?" Loki nodded. "Then let them put her to rest where she was happy in life too. Surely they know the queen's favorite places. You brought her here for a reason, let her rest here."

Loki's fingers contracted against the stone lip, and after a moment, he pushed himself to his feet but didn't turn to look at either human at his sides. Just let his curtain of disheveled hair mask his face from view for a little bit longer until he could compose himself enough. "But I don't know where to go myself now."

Tony and Rhodey both leaned back behind Loki - Tony with his brows raised in question and a nod towards Loki, Rhodey with a shrug and confirming bow of his head. "How's earth sound?"

It surprised Loki enough for him to whip around to face Tony, eyes still watery and now wide with confusion. They soon angled downwards again with resignation. "To jail me."

"Um, no. I heard about the kind of jail you had on Asgard, and _no_. Jail's no place to deal with loss. You can stay with me. You want to change your path, here's your chance. Recover and then... choose where you want to go and who you want to be."

Shock had dried some of the water from Loki's eyes as he looked back. "You would invite me into your home? Why? You barely know half of the horrors I've committed, some of them which have been on your land! You have no reason to help me. Pity does not even extend this far."

"And I don't pity you. I... fuck, I'm _sympathizing_ , okay? Jesus, alright, listen. Let's just... go over here for a minute, okay? Rhodey, can you give us a minute alone?" Rhodey nodded and moved back towards where they had first used Loki to teleport here. Using the hand Tony still had over Loki's, he shifted to take Loki's wrist and lead him away from the coffin to sit against the half-wall of rock that had separated his view of Loki's stolen obsession earlier. The stone wasn't quite fit for a seat, but it had enough scoops and curves to manage two uneven seats between himself and Loki. The god followed more out of incredulity than any manner of obedience, but Loki's mind didn't seem to be all there in his current state of health either.

"Look, we can't let our losses own us. As much as it feels like it would be so much easier to die right along with them, _that's_ the real dishonor to their memory. My friend, Rhodey back there, he once told me to let memories inspire me for more. To not let death stop me in my tracks."

"You know." Loki didn't ask because he knew the answer already. "How do you know?"

Shit. No good walks down favorable lanes today. Tony heaved a breath as heavy as his chest felt and took off his other glove to lay it on the ground. There was going to be no fight here today. Too much exhaustion. Just thinking about over two decades ago made Tony want to curl back up again.

"I tried to stop them from burying my mom too." Not a happy memory there. Obidiah had to physically hold Tony back and stop him from "doing anything rash" all while telling Tony to get a hold of himself. Tony didn't need to be reminded to keep a public face up; he needed his mother to not be lying in a box. He needed his father to not be the one that was behind the wheel of another too expensive, too fast car that cost Tony more than a price tag. "Didn't seem right that an accident could take away someone with such life. If she was never buried, she couldn't be dead, right? And if she wasn't dead, then I still had a chance to-" Shit... "to... fix things. But we can't. Sometimes we have to make it right afterwards. Let them be a wake-up call, not the cause of our own slow suicide. Loss defines us as much as happiness does, but we have to keep moving forward."

"I'm tired of moving forward." Loki admitted, numbness in his tone, and Tony's chest clenched remembering thinking those same words himself so many times. Could you want to stop existing without wanting to die? So many times he just wanted it to _stop_. But it wasn't worth it. Because if everything stopped for him, wasn't he doing to his friends what his own losses had done? If everything stopped, then there would be no more _anything_. And there were things to live for.

"We survive when others don't for a reason. So we find our reasons."

"You know." Loki repeated, a whole new implication behind his words this tims.

"Yeah, I do. And going by how many times you've defied death, you're not only slick as a snake in water, but someone's keeping you alive too. Maybe they've got a plan."

"I'm tired of _plans_ too." He said with more venom.

"Then fuck their plans and do what you want. Isn't that your style too?"

Loki's mouth curled down in uncertainty, but there was thought going on there, discernment of a future and making a future, at least.

"So let her go." Tony nodded towards the coffin. "And try to find out what kind of person you can live with being. Not the kind of person she would be proud of - don't set yourself up under someone else's standards of happiness or you'll never be happy, and you'll end up here again. Believe me, I know that too."

"This sounds time-consuming."

Tony laughed a bit at the thoroughly sarcastic world-weariness in Loki. "You got a date elsewhere?"

Finally, Loki broke the faintest smile. "Apparently I do. To see a man about a new place to stay."

"Expenses there are a real bargain. Better than Asgard's simple price of all your sanity."

He shrugged. "They can't take what I no longer have." The briefly higher spirits faded back into deeper contemplation, and Loki stared across at the product of months of work and intense prepossession all for no progress in any sort of positive direction.

"I will make arrangements to speak with the Vanir about interring my mother here. She'd always abhorred the Aesir's way; Frigga was far fonder of the Vanir and elves' passage rites."

"No burning boats?"

"No. And no crypts or tombs either. Vanir gods return their bodies to the earth with a seed. As the world has given life and nourishment to us, so we shall give it back to the world. To have our death mean something, not just in our personal afterlife, but in the lives of those that come after us. It's a dignified and quiet ceremony. It would suit her well."

"Sounds nice."

"It is." He agreed, then frowned. "I just... I need to prepare myself for these discussions."

"It takes time. That's fine."

"I can take us back to Midgard afterwards, but it will take more than a moment to replenish energy enough to move all three of us."

"It's fine, Loki. Take your time."

"I'm still fighting the idea that you're helping." Loki managed a pained laugh. "Like it's an illusion my mind concocted, and when I arrive at your tower, the real you will be there, hating me."

Tony shifted to put his hand over the back of Loki's again and squeeze it. "This is real. And I'm real. So is Rhodey. And when we go back to my place, I'll still be real, and you'll still have a place there as long as you'd like."

"I don't trust good fortune."

"And this one comes with a price. Forgiveness of an enemy, you have to accept and move forward from what's happened. That sucks enough to dampen 'good fortunes.'"

"Thank you, Stark." Loki said after a long pause.

"Well, I did come here to stop you. Just didn't realize I would be doing exactly that for a whole 'nother reason."

"I just wanted her back."

_And I just wanted to prove we weren't so similar. Looks like we both got the opposite of what we wanted._

"Welcome to the fun that is reality lately. Wanna be my partner in managing to survive it?"

The god still looked so very tired, so ready for a dreamless sleep, and actual rest, but he still pulled a small smile. "I'd be willing to try."

**Author's Note:**

> For more of my prompt fills, check out my story ["From A Line"](http://archiveofourown.org/works/3251894/chapters/7087586) that contains all of the prompt fills from Tumblr!


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